President George W. Bush was in Florida this week, addressing a convention of cardiologists. Before taking the podium, Bush cracked a joke: “I thought about inviting Vice President (Dick) Cheney to travel with me today, but he said he’s seen enough cardiologists lately.”

The President of course was referring to his Vice President’s very public heart problems. While amusing, it does illustrate a very important point: no one in this country is immune from health problems, not even our ruling class – which makes the issue of health care all the more magnified.

At the conference, Bush addressed a very key issue to the health care debate in this country: patients’ rights. A bill is currently making its way through Congress that would permit federal juries to award up to $5 million to a patient who has been harmed by the denial of care from a health insurance company.

Bush opposes this bill, saying it would allow for “frivolous” lawsuits. Instead, he has stated that he would support a cap on such awards, and he’s cited Texas as an example of state that has an appropriate cap on such awards – $750,000. In addition, Bush would support legislation that permitted a medical review process for patients who are denied care.

How do you feel about patients’ rights? If you were drafting a “patients’ bill of rights", what would you include? Do you think patients who are wrongly denied care should be permitted to sue their health insurance companies? If so, for how much?

Finally, how do you feel about the overall quality of our nation’s health care system? What, if anything, do you think needs to be improved?